The limits of science and a world record

I have written about the “limits of science” here a few times – there are limits, of course, but not in the way some religious detractors of science claim. This cartoon illustrates what is wrong with their arguments. From The limits of science « Why Evolution Is True).

The author suffers from a serious case of magical balance fairy disease.

“Since the moon landings came to prominence in 1969, the role of scientific knowledge – especially an idea of scientific consensus – has played a starring role in the ensuing academic enquiry/political debate/trench warfare (delete as preferred).

Beyond a depressingly binary characterisation of simply pro or anti-science, I’d argue sceptics cannot simply be written off as anti-science or conspiracy theorists (although I am sure one or two may fall into that category). Rather, they see themselves as upholding the standards of what they’d call “real science”.

Many moon landing sceptics worry that science cannot be dubbed scientific as it is not falsifiable (as in Popper’s demarcation criterion). They claim that while elements of of the moon landings may be testable in the lab, the complexity of actually landing on the moon and flags waving in a vacuum, as well as the levels of uncertainty in shadows from photographs are too high to be a useful basis for public certainty.”

Skepticism is a process; not a position.
You can take a skeptic and ask them about their methodology and they will cheerfully share the steps they took to arrive at their position and the safeguards built it.
Science deniers just get confused when you ask them about their methodology.
Don’t want to be associated with the anti-vaxxers and the fluoride nutters and the tobacco lobbyists out there? I can understand that.
The best way to put distance between you and them is to operate differently.
Don’t use the arguments that the nutters use.
Don’t use no-name blogs like they do.
Don’t pit yourself against the mainstream and justify it with some dopey and suitably vague conspriacy theory that you can only hint at.

Above all, don’t whine loudly that you are just somehow different. Talk is cheap.
You’re not the same as the nutters? Then demonstrate it in the way you approach the topic. Easy fix.

I can’t say that I’m impressed that Watts supposedly qualifies as ‘mainstream’ (or scientific) on the basis that he’s willing to reject outlandish claims that can be easily disproven by simple laboratory experiments.

Personally, I find his willingness to put up guest posts by Monckton on his blog to be a pretty damning indictment on his sceptical credentials. By that standard, finding a group sufficiently crazy that he can rail against them for bringing the side into disrepute is a pretty impressive feat.

I saw Watt’s demolition of the CO2 in a jam jar experiment that was supposedly “proof” of the CO2 = warming theory and I was impressed at his tenacity. The similar experiment shown in Al Gore’s “reality project” was clearly flawed

I am also impressed at the surfacestations.org project
Both these projects seem to be in the spirit of scientific endeavour.

Watts allows many guest posters on his blog. Some he doesn’t always agree with ,and he states this, on occasion

So essentially, Andy, you don’t think you’re under any obligation to back up whatever round of ridiculous nonsense Watts is promulgating this time around. Fair enough. I can safely dismiss it as a load of propaganda originating from somebody who has a history of making false allegations about other peoples’ honesty, then.

So essentially, Andy, you don’t think you’re under any obligation to back up whatever round of ridiculous nonsense Watts is promulgating this time around. Fair enough. I can safely dismiss it as a load of propaganda originating from somebody who has a history of making false allegations about other peoples’ honesty, then.

Andy, what a load of crap. All Watt had to do is repeat the experiment to see if it worked. Why go to such trouble. All he has established, if anything, is that the video was shot in a number of goes and tricks were used to improve the quality. Perfectly normal. You don’t for one minute believe what you see at the movies is exactly how things happened do you? The aim is to communicate in a video, not repeat in detail if that presents problems. The student of course does it for themselves.

One can’t help thinking he repeated the experiment, found it worked, so rather than give the issue away he adopted a childish analysis of continuity, visibility, etc.

Frankly I would like to see if it did work – tempted to repeat it myself but don’t have access to a lab at the moment.

So what was the point of such a carry on – he even admits that he accepts the well established IR absorption and radiation properties of greenhouse gases – which some of you mates don’t.

Surely you guys have something more substantive than this to waste your time on?

Surely you guys have something more substantive than this to waste your time on?

Well you obviously don’t. This “experiment” was clearly frigged.
if this is the standard of “science” that you expect then I am very happy that your colleagues at AgResearch are being restructured.
They can stop ripping off the taxpayer with their junk science and find a real job more suited to their talents, like shoplifting, or working as a politician or a traffic warden

Of course the presentation was a set up – how else can one get a clear message across. The point is that any school kid can repeat the experiment for herself. Now then, you produce evidence they can’t and I will listen to you.

Meanwhile, I know the difference between an education video presentation and a real time experiment. The later might be very convincing in real life but impossible to portray clearly on a short video.

Come on Andy – If you want to prove Gore wrong do the bloody experiment. The proof of the pudding is in the eating, not in a film made about the eating.

And you couldn’t help sticking the boot into honest scientists again, could you. Just as you did with NIWA – and that was expensive for you, wasn’t it? Have you guys paid that bill yet?

You invited me to ask for more information, Andy. You can hardly blame me for taking you up on the offer.

Yes, I’m aware of the mutual sarcasm at play here. But I think this pretty clearly demonstrates that you’ve decided to simply seize on anything nasty Watts has to say without so much as bothering to see what the response to the allegation is.

I think it says a lot about Watts, as well. Plainly he’s spent time trawling through the videos in search of ammunition, and the best he’s been able to come up with is “I agree with the science you’re trying to communicate, but your experimental setup was flawed?”

Considering the need for a disclaimer to that effect (“not criticising science. Only Gore”), at the end of a rather long screed of text, is it any wonder the guy’s plagued by these Slayer people?

I don’t think Watt showed the experimental setup was flawed – one can’t show that from analysis of a video, only that the video has discontinuities and enhancements. That is a matter of presentation not science (yes I know poor old Andy pretends he can’t tell the difference).

The way to test if the experimental setup was flawed is to repeat the experiment. It’s a basic principle.

In fairness, Watts does claim to have attempted to replicate the experiment, but as you point out, he’s not the most trustworthy of sources. Since I’m not inclined to run through it for myself, I’ll give the original experimenters the benefit of the doubt, particularly considering the colossal bias of the accuser.

Net result: Bad-mouthing of Gore, confusion of Watts’ blog readers. Neither of which is exactly new stuff.

Chris, you’ll give the experimenters the benefit of the doubt, even though they fudged the results, used continuity tricks etc.

It never ceases to amaze me the lengths the warmist creed will go to protect their faith. On a scale of 1 to 10 where 1 is modern day Anglicanism, and 10 is fundamentalist Islam, the Warmists are at about 11

The question does arise, then as to how you define a “sceptic”. If you can go to all the effort to test an experiment, or to log every single weather station in the USA, and have your work dismissed as “rubbish”, then there is little point in engaging in any further civilised discourse.

Were Watts’ goal to correct the video’s errors, he could have communicated directly with the people who made it, pointing out the errors and suggesting corrections so that the experiment would work as advertised (video continuity is neither here nor there if the work has been done and can be reproduced according to the instructions given). Watts does not, after all, dispute the science they were trying to communicate.

Hell, Watts could have reproduced the content of this letter on his blog and stated that he was awaiting a response. Similar assumption of the moral high ground, and the opportunity to take credit for changes made, whilst reserving the right to lay into them at a later date if the changes are not made.

Instead, he went directly to his blog and launched a vicious little attack on the video’s makers. Quite how this is meant to help the video’s original audience is unclear, since the two sites are probably viewed by very different people. Rather, the goal would seem to be to smear the video’s makers whilst setting himself up as a scientific authority. And hang any actual improvement of anybody’s understanding of the science.

What would it take for me to conclude Watts was correct on this? An acknowledgement of error on the part of the video’s creators would do it. Or a neutral third party investigating independently of Watts and finding the same problems. Short of that, I would need to conduct the experiment for myself, and frankly, I’m not investing the time to do so just for the sake of settling an internet argument.

Now, there’s a pretty effective filter for assessing whether something Watts his done is constructive or worthwhile. Namely, has it produced any peer-reviewed research? By that standard, the surfacestations.org project is indeed worthwhile. Of course, that research has pretty clearly concluded that the siting of temperature stations has not produced any distortions of temperature records.

I’m really not sure that anything else Watts has ever done has made it past peer-review (no, wait, apparently he has a grand total of two peer-reviewed papers), so the surface stations project looks very much like cherry-picked example of his work.

Bottom line, Andy? Watts might well be correct about the experiment. Were that to be clearly shown, I’d have no problem with it. I might even go so far as to send in that email suggesting corrections. It doesn’t alter the science one whit, however, only the experimental setup required. Nor does it have any particular impact on the reputations of those involved on either side. Maybe a little damage to those of Gore and Nye, no net effect on that of Watts (technically correct but needlessly belligerent in getting his point across).

Once again, I find myself asking, what wider point do you wish to convince us of?

Well, we’ll never know, as Watts does not appear to be in the business of writing polite letters to anybody.

Funnily enough, nobody has claimed that cookie jars full of air resemble the earth’s climate, or model anything. If you are unclear, however, as to what the experiment demonstrates (regardless of who is doing it properly), then plainly you haven’t learned anything from Watts’ little piece.

Watts seems to be making a big hoo-ha over nothing.
It’s not really an experiment, it’s just a demo.
In the same way that baking a cake on a cooking show is not really cooking.
Two or three examples of the cake at various stages are pre-prepared for the sake of the magic of television.
Not much cooking actually goes on.

…CO2 in a jam jar experiment that was supposedly “proof” of the CO2 = warming theory…

Nope. Sane people don’t look at jam jars and go “Oh, CO2=warming”
Neither do sane people go to some no-name blog and watch a “debunking of the jam jars and go “Oh, CO2=/=warming”.
It’s just a demo. Made for video.

We know what CO2 does. It’s basic science. What Bill Nye did was not strange or unusual. There are multiple examples of showing how CO2 works to trap heat and such demonstrations are as common as dirt.

Funnily enough, nobody has claimed that cookie jars full of air resemble the earth’s climate, or model anything.

Seconded.
NASA does science. It would be nice if all it took were jam jars and some guy with a blog. Sadly, actual real-world science is usually more expensive than that. Satellites, supercomputers, etc. Sometimes, the truth cannot be wrapped up in a napkin and presented to you at the breakfast table.

You know, Andy, I can’t help but note that Watts gets the science badly wrong on a regular basis. To the point that he’s become the boy who cried wolf. If anybody has been pushing a message with no regard for the science, it is Watts. Technically, there’s no reason he can’t be right on occasion, but such is his reputation that I’d expect to get independent confirmation from somebody before making that conclusion.

Nor does the existing science change based on one person getting their experimental setup wrong. This particular observation has been made and confirmed any number of times, using a multitude of methods. Watts certainly isn’t trying to contest the basic observation, he’s just seized on an opportunity to smear somebody he doesn’t like.

Even here, where he seems to think he’s on very solid ground, he hasn’t exactly covered himself with glory. Consider the number of commenters who seem to think Watts has debunked the greenhouse effect. Rather than clarifying the science, he has managed to sow confusion among those silly enough to read his blog. Which is pretty much his modus operandii, so shouldn’t be a surprise to anybody.

It’s a shame that this so called demo doesn’t actually demo anything, because the glass absorbs the IR…

Huh? Both jars are made of glass, not just one.
This isnt’ rocket science, Andy Scrace. We’re not dealing with something cutting-edge. It’s basis stuff. It’s been done a zillion times.
CO2 really does absorb IR.

But I guess that is all OK in the world of “climate science”.

That would be NASA’s world.
NASA.
NASA is a pioneer and leader in climate science. It’s you versus NASA and every single scientific community on the planet. That’s not changing. It was true yesterday and it’s true today and it’s going to be true twenty years from now.
Same goes for the moon landings.
NASA and every single scientific community on the planet are not lying to you in some spooky-wooky global conspiracy. It’s dumb.

Yes, Andy, I am suggesting you have an ulterior motive. How else do we explain your choice of “scam artists” to expose? You could just as well go after the anti-fluoride activists, or the anti-vaccers, or the ID crowd. Or that Monckton chap. I gather he says some ridiculously untrue things.

Now. I have asked this before, Andy: What broader perspective do you hope to convey with your tireless work? What message, if you could but make it stick, would satisfy you that we were all on the same page?

Let’s see some big picture stuff, rather than endless argumentation over trivialities.

Which makes your statement about glass absorbing IR inane. If they are both glass then they will both react the same. Unless you are suggesting that one jar is make of some special glass or something wierd.

We are not on the same page.

Well, duh.
Why else would Chris ask you what message, if you could but make it stick, would satisfy you that were were all on the same page?

Don’t worry, it’s only a demo, it is merely to present a concept that I can put a cake in a white box and it will cook it.

Very unconvincing.
There is no “concept”.
It’s not edgy experimental or poorly understood.
CO2 is not a mystery gas. It absorbs IR. We alreadly know this. There any number of ways to demonstrate this. It’s not hard at all. You are more comfortable with irrelevent analogies than the basic physics. Watts has made himself look like an idiot over this and his little sheep have duitifully gone “BAA BAA” at his behest.

Andy says –“neither he nor I are trying to claim that CO2 doesn’t absorb and re emit radiative, just that the demo doesn’t show this and can’t work as advertised.”

1: No-one has shown if it works or not – if it concerns you try it out for yourself. The dismantling of the video is pointless – it proves nothing. 2: It’s a silly diversion. 3: We all agree that CO2 and other greenhouse gases present a problem. We just disagree on what we do about it.

(Mind you, I am not speaking for all Andy’s mates as some of them reckon they have proved that CO2 is not a problem. They claim to have disproved our understanding of the fundamental properties of CO2.)

“We are not on the same page. I would have thought that was fairly clear.”

Yes, Andy, it is clear. I would like to know, in your own words, what page you ARE on. I have my own (somewhat uncharitable, I freely admit) opinion on the matter, but it would be nice to contrast that with your own self-assessment. You never know, I might have you mischaracterised.

Watts is claiming that the glass absorbs all or most of the IR, so it doesn’t penetrate into the glass bottle, it only heats the glass.

Andy, both jars are glass. They are the same.
Do a different experiment with plastic containers and it’s not going to be a problem.
As long as both containers are the same, then it doesn’t matter.
One gets CO2 put in it, the other does not. That’s the difference.
This is bog standard stuff.
It’s hardly rocket science.
Leave that to NASA.

I don’t know if this is correct, but that’s the claim anyway.

You don’t have to rely on just Watts’ blog.
You don’t have to just go along with what he says.
Think for yourself. Look for other examples.
Other people have done the same thing. You can go on Youtube and find plenty of examples with all sorts of variations. It’s not just Al Gore or Bill Nye. They didn’t come up with it first.
Its not theirs.
Forget ’em.
Just look at the experiment and see what it demonstrates. This is something you could probably find in a high school lab text. It’s trivial.

But I guess that is all OK in the world of “climate science”.

It really and truly does work. It’s been done.
Climatology is not going to collapse or be shown to be somehow worthy of scare quotes because of this. Watts has done nothing worthwhile and shame on those for egging him on without bothering to think this through.

I’m sorry, Andy, which of us brought up the present extraordinarily narrow and irrelevant argument and now refuses to let it go? Why don’t you present your ‘big picture’ stuff and we’ll go from there. It may well be that we’re operating on different definitions of what the big picture is.

I do hope you have something beyond “surface temperature has been fairly flat over the past carefully selected timeframe,” because that sure as hell doesn’t seem to encompass everything you’re unhappy about.

If, after having laid out where you’re coming from, you would like to know my position, I will be happy to spell it out for you.

Yes I wonder what the big picture is too Chris
I often angst over the metaphysical nature of our lives and the imponderables that were previously explained by religious leaders. Now left with a smidgen of string theory and some inpenetrable tangle of quantum mechanics and general relativity, we wonder what it is all about.

I do have to park this big picture stuff though, because at the end of the day we are just animals looking for our next feed or our next root (not necessarily square) . One has to focus on the smaller issues, like lightbulbs shining at glass jars, because ultimately big pictures are comprised of a multitude of small ones.

The plastic might not absorb IR, but the glass does, therefore little or no IR can penetrate into the jar.
This is my assertion…

If both containers are the same…then even if your assertion is correct, what difference will it make?
There are two (2) jars, remember? One gets the CO2, the other >>>does not<<<.
As long as BOTH containers are the same then what’s the problem?
Think about it.
If they are BOTH made of glass and your assertion is correct then….
If they are BOTH made of glass and your assertion is not correct then…
If they are BOTH made of plastic and your assertion doesn’t apply then….
(facepalm)
They don’t even have to be jars.
Mythbusters used minature glasshouses made from wood frames and gladwrap and then shined studio lights on them.
It’s an experiment that’s been done many times before with multiple variations.
It works.
People even video the results and put them up on Youtube.
Unless you think that there’s a vast internet conspiracy to create the illusion that this has been done successfully many times before?

Therefore, we would expect no difference in temperature rise between the two glass jars. The glass jars block the IR so the CO2 is irrelevant

Exactly. There would be no temperature rise…if glass jars were somehow a problem. Yet there seems to be no problem with glass jars.
Apart from your assertion.

Take glass jars out of the equation if it makes you feel better.
It makes no difference.
You can use plastic or you can go the mythbusters way and set up your own tiny greenhouses.
Easy fix.
The experiement works with all kinds of variations.
People even video the results and put them up on Youtube.
Unless you think that there’s a vast internet conspiracy to create the illusion that this has been done successfully many times before?

Andy, you are assuming all the incident radiation is at wavelengths absorbed by glass. Extremely unlikely.

If this rather naive setup is to replicate the issue at all, it is the re-emitted radiation (incident radiation absorbed inside the bottles, and then remitted at the lower temperature), which will be absorbed (and re-emitted but in all directions). Glass could also absorbed the re-emitted radiation but that will be a common factor.

Although big issues are indeed made up of a multitude of smaller ones, Andy, you really ought to cultivate some understanding of how they fit together when making up the bigger issue.

Otherwise, you run the risk of focusing in myopically on some minor question which really has no relevance at all to any broader subject. As you have here. You may also wind up divorcing some particular point from its wider context.

Now, in regards to wider issues, I think it’s worth remembering why you’re trying to hammer home a particular point to begin with. That is, if/when you manage to get your audience to agree with you, what will you have proved? What immediate further argument will you use the agreed-upon point in support of?

Thus far, I see two possibilities:
1) Anthony Watts is capable of identifying and exposing flawed experimental methodology at a high school science level.
2) Al Gore (or whoever did it on his behalf, but the responsibility is ultimately his) has produced and disseminated a video incorporating said flawed methodology, demonstrating a fair amount of carelessness, considering how many times variants on the experiment have been conducted.

I suppose there might be further arguments to be made from the second conclusion, but you’d want additional supporting evidence before making them. As far as the established science goes, well, I’m unaware of any broader conclusions that could be drawn.

As a final note, I find it severely worrying that conclusion 1 seems to be in dispute. There is, after all, an ongoing argument over whether or not Watts’ criticisms are accurate. If not, it says some pretty damning things about his ability to vet his own work. Perhaps, in light of this, this minor point really is worth settling once and for all.

First, was the experiment actually performed or was it just a staged thing.

What difference does it make?
You do understand that this experiment is famous, right? You do understand that it’s not Al Gore’s or Bill Nye’s experiment, right? They are just re-creating it from high school level science. It’s been done to death.

As Chris pointed out…
“1) Anthony Watts is capable of identifying and exposing flawed experimental methodology at a high school science level.
2) Al Gore (or whoever did it on his behalf, but the responsibility is ultimately his) has produced and disseminated a video incorporating said flawed methodology, demonstrating a fair amount of carelessness, considering how many times variants on the experiment have been conducted.”

…is glass opaque to IR thus bringing the methodology into question.
I am more interested in the second question, but I suspect I may be on my own in this curious diversion.

Sadly, there’s just no way to know for sure.
Science doesn’t know everything.
Such things are shrouded in mystery and lost to civilization.
Wise men can only meditate quietly on the question and ponder.
……
……
……
(Or use google.)

The fact is that Watts tried to reproduce the experiment as shown and failed to get a result similar to the video.

So? Where’s the MacGuffin?

“1) Anthony Watts is capable of identifying and exposing flawed experimental methodology at a high school science level.
2) Al Gore (or whoever did it on his behalf, but the responsibility is ultimately his) has produced and disseminated a video incorporating said flawed methodology, demonstrating a fair amount of carelessness, considering how many times variants on the experiment have been conducted.”
(shrug)

Huh? Surely an IR spectrometer or whatever the gadget is called would identify the opacity of glass to infrared radiation.

Pure speculation. How could anyone even make an IR spectrometer or something? It’s all too hard and radical. Nobody has ever even thought of such a thing, let alone done it before.
Nobody.
Science doesn’t know everything.
Glass and it’s effect on IR is a total mystery to science.
Maybe, some day, our grandchildren will plumb it’s fug of darkness.
But for now, we can only ponder helplessly and make hapless assertions.
……
……
……
(Or use google)

Andy, you have nothing.
We know about glass jars. Hardly a mystery.
IR? Yeah, pretty well known thing.

…is glass opaque to IR thus bringing the methodology into question.
I am more interested in the second question…

Then google it, you tool.
Stop being so thick.
What is your problem?

The fact is that Watts tried to reproduce the experiment as shown and failed to get a result similar to the video.

So? Where’s the MacGuffin?

“1) Anthony Watts is capable of identifying and exposing flawed experimental methodology at a high school science level.
2) Al Gore (or whoever did it on his behalf, but the responsibility is ultimately his) has produced and disseminated a video incorporating said flawed methodology, demonstrating a fair amount of carelessness, considering how many times variants on the experiment have been conducted.”
(shrug)

Andy, if you can decipher the paper, it may just give you information relevant to your burning questions about infrared radiation, heat transfer and glass. Plus, you can examine the references for further information.

As you have noted, this is something the rest of us seem to be rather less interested in than you, so you can either pursue it for your own edification or not.

As I say, Andy, this is a topic which you are obsessing over, not the rest of us. Even if Watts’ accusations are correct (and there seems to be a fair amount of doubt over that), there really aren’t any significant consequences.

Probably the best way to establish why Watts couldn’t get the experiment to work is to have a go for yourself, using the basic equipment list (glass jars, heat lamps, thermometers and CO2), and try tweaking things until you do get a result in line with the video. If you can get that result, you can then work out how your methodology differs from Watts’, and whether your methodology is compatible with the video’s.

Even if Watts’ accusations are correct (and there seems to be a fair amount of doubt over that), there really aren’t any significant consequences.

The MacGuffin is stubbornly absent.
Certainly nothing to justify changing science into “science” or climate science into “climate science”, for example.
No scam artists have been exposed at all. Difficult to see how it would be possible give that Andy now thinks that it’s all irrelevant anyway, as it has little to do with how the atmosphere works, unless your life revolves around experiments involving two bottles.

One point that Watts makes is that the glass in the jar blocks the IR radiation… only not even this point seems to stand up under close scrutiny. Thanks to the miracle of google, it doesn’t seem likely that glass is completely opaque to IR. Otherwise, we would have no need for double glazing. Thermal imaging techniques on houses show heat loss through windows.

Of course, it still begs the question of why Watts couldn’t get the experiment to work.

Maybe he didn’t really try? Or he’s just hopelessly incompetent. A child could do it. In fact, they have.
Ken himself noted that he did not see it at all. Just a break down of presentation issues such as continuity, marks in the thermometers, movement of equipment between shots, etc. There was no actual experimental repeat anywhere – but then again there was so much irrelevant crap there that Ken could have missed it.

Yet the experiment does work. It’s famous. Other people have done it lots of times with multiple variations.
Watts made a big hoo-ha over nothing. Shame on him.

Andy, you do grasp that Watts is not a disinterested observer, what with openly hating Al Gore with the fiery fury of a thousand burning suns, right?

Nor, come to that, do you come across as neutral, what with talk of “gorebots” and “indoctrination.” But then, you do seem to quite like Watts’ work, so a causative link seems a reasonable hypothesis. Heck, the language appears to be lifted directly from Watts’ blog (the wonders of google and keyword searches at work there).

Is it any wonder that sceptics are disinclined to simply take Watts’ claims at face value, given this vendetta? That they expect some kind of independent verification before accepting Watts’ version of events?

Now, as sceptics, we would also expect to see replication of the experiment before conclusively stating that it works. At the moment, you may have noted that people have stated that they see no reason why it shouldn’t, in principle. This is not quite the same thing as implicitly trusting Al Gore, but nor is it the condemnation you seem to expect.

Where you are running into problems is that, short of running through it for ourselves, we’re reserving judgement. Nor is the question vital enough for us to run through the experiment, considering that it has no impact whatsoever on the state of the science.

One of many differences between us is that you seem to trust Watts’ word that he has properly carried out the work. Whereas I look at his history of statements about Gore and question whether he is an objective source of information.

I believe this has been covered in the past, Andy, but we have a difference of opinion about the meaning of the word “sceptic”. When I use the term, I mean, in brief, “people who expect evidence to back up claims made.” Whether or not those claims are made by a particular side of a given debate.

“Climate change sceptics,” as you use the phrase, generally turn out to be people who are profoundly critical about claims made in support of anthropogenic climate change, whilst not turning anything like that level of scrutiny on claims made by people on their own side.

Now, were I referring to those people, you may rest assured that I would be very clear about it. You may also rest assured that I would use a different descriptor, considering my assessment of their sceptical credentials.

Ah yes, further nasty language, pretty thoroughly revealing a certain bias in terms of your opinion of Al Gore. You seem to think that, if you can just attack Al Gore in isolation, you can somehow influence peoples’ opinions on the science. In fact, the best you might be able to accomplish is to smear Gore. Which may be sufficient for anyone with a shallow understanding of the science involved, but isn’t going to influence those of us who don’t rely on Al Gore as a primary source of scientific information in the first place.

This may come as a shock to you, but Al Gore gets his information from the scientific community, not the other way around. If we think he may have gotten something wrong (and he’s a communicator, rather than a working scientist, so I’m sure it happens), we will check what he has had to say against peer-reviewed research, or against what scientific organisations have to say on the subject. Just as we would if we thought Watts might have gotten something wrong.

It comes as no surprise that Al Gore gets his information from scientists, of course.
For example, when he presented his graph that showed correlation of CO2 and global temperature in The Inconvenient Truth, he got this information from the Vostok Ice cores, which of course show that CO2 levels lag temperature, not the other way round.

You say “shame on him” yet he got off his butt and did the experiment…

Well, he doesn’t seem to have actually done so.
The experiment, I mean.
Ken himself noted that he did not see it at all. Just a break down of presentation issues such as continuity, marks in the thermometers, movement of equipment between shots, etc. There was no actual experimental repeat anywhere – but then again there was so much irrelevant crap there that Ken could have missed it.

…which is more than Gore and his faithful Gorebots did, apparently.

Have you done the experiment?
It doesn’t seem to be the case.
Any of the commenters at Watt’s blog?
Hmm.
You seem to have confined yourself to making empty-headed assertions about glass jars and IR that you yourself find out to be perhaps not quite righty-tighty upon a casual google search.
I don’t think I’ve ever used Al Gore as an information source on climate change. I know little of the man. It’s the climate deniers who seem to have this crank-obsession with him.
Personally, I get my climate science information from NASA.
NASA and every single scientific community on the planet.
Not too sure what’s that got to do with Al Gore.
Haven’t even watched his movie. It’s more of an American thing.

Besides, there’s still no MacGuffin.
Even if Gore or anybody else botched a simple high school experiment, so what?
Other people have done it successfully. It’s famous. It works.

However, Gore does deserve…

Why do you care about Gore so much? What’s the point?
We don’t.
NASA, remember?
(shrug)

Unlikely, he’s not a scientist. He’s just passing on the information second-hand.
When I want information on ice core or hockey sticks or whatnot then I won’t rely on some documentary or other. I’ll go to NASA.
NASA and every single scientific community on the planet.
Happy to use documentaries or videos to illustrate the science but if they don’t measure up to what the scientific communities themselves are saying then, well, so much the worse for the documentaries.

Well, he doesn’t seem to have actually done so.
The experiment, I mean.
Ken himself noted that he did not see it at all. Just a break down of presentation issues such as continuity, marks in the thermometers, movement of equipment between shots, etc. There was no actual experimental repeat anywhere – but then again there was so much irrelevant crap there that Ken could have missed it.
I’m entitled to expect some kind of independent verification before accepting Watts’ version of events.
Trust but verify, right?

(shrug)

Now maybe Ken’s wrong. Maybe he just didn’t see it.
Or…Watts was just going on about presentations issues etc.

Yet there’s still no MacGuffin.
The problem Watts has is that it’s a famous experiment.
You can Youtube it to death.
Even children can do it successfully.

Now if the emperiment was done badly in some documentary, that’s a tad embarrassing but…so what?

As Chris said…“1) Anthony Watts is capable of identifying and exposing flawed experimental methodology at a high school science level.
2) Al Gore (or whoever did it on his behalf, but the responsibility is ultimately his) has produced and disseminated a video incorporating said flawed methodology, demonstrating a fair amount of carelessness, considering how many times variants on the experiment have been conducted.”

Any way you cut it, Watts made a big hoo-ha over nothing. Shame on him.

When I want information on ice core or hockey sticks or whatnot then I won’t rely on some documentary or other. I’ll go to NASA.
NASA and every single scientific community on the planet.
Happy to use documentaries or videos to illustrate the science but if they don’t measure up to what the scientific communities themselves are saying then, well, so much the worse for the documentaries.
Same diff for anything put out by Sinclair.

He relies on NASA and every single scientific community on the planet too.
Climate deniers seem to have a problem with that.

Just did a quick check and, yep, NASA does seem to be in agreement with Sinclair about the Ice cores and how they fit into the big picture.
It’s almost like he copied NASA directly from their website.
That’s very smart move so I’ll carefully do the same.

The Earth’s climate has changed throughout history. Just in the last 650,000 years there have been seven cycles of glacial advance and retreat, with the abrupt end of the last ice age about 7,000 years ago marking the beginning of the modern climate era — and of human civilization. Most of these climate changes are attributed to very small variations in Earth’s orbit that change the amount of solar energy our planet receives.
The current warming trend is of particular significance because most of it is very likely human-induced and proceeding at a rate that is unprecedented in the past 1,300 years.
Earth-orbiting satellites and other technological advances have enabled scientists to see the big picture, collecting many different types of information about our planet and its climate on a global scale. Studying these climate data collected over many years reveal the signals of a changing climate.

Certain facts about Earth’s climate are not in dispute:
■ The heat-trapping nature of carbon dioxide and other gases was demonstrated in the mid-19th century. Their ability to affect the transfer of infrared energy through the atmosphere is the scientific basis of many instruments flown by NASA. Increased levels of greenhouse gases must cause the Earth to warm in response.
■ Ice cores drawn from Greenland, Antarctica, and tropical mountain glaciers show that the Earth’s climate responds to changes in solar output, in the Earth’s orbit, and in greenhouse gas levels. They also show that in the past, large changes in climate have happened very quickly, geologically-speaking: in tens of years, not in millions or even thousands.

Scientific Consensus
Ninety-seven percent of climate scientists agree that climate-warming trends over the past century are very likely due to human activities, and most of the leading scientific organizations worldwide have issued public statements endorsing this position.

Sure but you must know that this is a P.R.A.T.T, right?
I glad that you are not saying that it disproved AGW because that’s very true.
It doesn’t.
Not at all.
Not even a little bit.
And shame on those who let it swing in the breeze to pretend otherwise.

gore was being a bit deceptive in his presentation.

I don’t get my science from Al Gore.
No really, I don’t.
To me, he’s just an American politician. I honestly don’t care about him one way or another. Have you ever heard me say anything nice about him?
Nope.
Never saw his presentation either. Never linked to it and never used it as evidence. I don’t care what he did or did not do and I just don’t get why you really have such venom for him.
NASA, on the other hand, I have linked to a million times.

Can’t bring myself to listen to greentard SinclIr and his nasally patronizing drone.

Then check out the NASA website devoted solely to climate change in sweet silence.
Or if you just want a different voice then there are other videos.

Climate denier P.R.A.T.T.’s have been debunked in detail by lots of people.
That’s why they are called P.R.A.T.T’s.
For very good reason, the best debunkers always seem to use heaps of info from NASA.
NASA and every single scientific community on the planet.
There’s no good reason to just meekly get your science info from no-name blogs written by cranks.
Happy to use documentaries or videos to illustrate the science but if they don’t measure up to what the scientific communities themselves are saying then, well, so much the worse for the documentaries.
Same diff for anything put out by Sinclair.
Same diff for anything put out by Hatfield.

Just a break down of presentation issues such as continuity, marks in the thermometers, movement of equipment between shots, etc. There was no actual experimental repeat anywhere – but then again there was so much irrelevant crap there that Ken could have missed it.

It reminds me that NASA film shows flags waving in the breeze on the moon. Given the chance I bet Watts would have been first to spot that too, but at the time he was too dazed by his early experiments with gravity.

In fairness, Watts seems to have made two lengthy posts on the topic, one in which he rants about the editing and whatnot, and the second, posted a few weeks later, in which he runs through his version of the experiment. Ken has presumably seen the first of these posts.

But after all this endless agitation on the subject on your part, Andy, I really don’t give a damn if Watts is right or not. The question is so very narrow and meaningless that, in effect, all victory does is give him the distinction of having once beaten Al Gore at high school level science. Good for propaganda purposes, I suppose, but sod all else.

Hell, Watts himself seems pretty clear in his little disclaimer that the only takeaway message from the exercise is “don’t trust Al Gore, because he’s gotten this experiment wrong.”

In response to Cedric’s comments on Gore. I do have a problem with “An Inconvenient Truth” being used as education material in schools, when it is so full of holes and downright wrongness.

In response to Chris, this particular thread started by me posting a link to a Guardian article suggesting that the likes of Watts were true champions of the scientific method (superb trolling on the Guardian, it has to be said)

If the scientific method includes running your own experiments, making the methodology and results open for scrutiny, then maybe the author of said Guardian piece has a point

So, the true champions of the scientific method are the people putting their work through peer-review, what with academic papers including clear methodology, being checked for any obvious mistakes prior to publication, and being subject to subsequent criticism on the basis of further research or failure to replicate the results.

– block FOI requests
– use tricks to “Hide the Decline”
– try to get editors of journals they don’t approve of sacked
– instruct their colleagues to delete inconvenient emails
– place models over reality and empirical data everytime
– delete comments on blogs they run that don’t agree with their world view
– sneer and drone about how superior and sanctimonious they are
Etc

Now. Before we descend into yet another endless argument in which no substantive reason for overturning any aspect of the science on global warming is put forward, here’s an opportunity for you.

I have a standing policy, where I am willing to read at least one book on a particular topic, suggested to me be a proponent of that viewpoint. That is the reason I have read such offerings as Nature’s Destiny and Life’s X Factor. If nothing else, it gives me a clear-cut understanding of the arguments made, from people who are considered to be effective communicators of their view.

I have yet to read that one book on “why global warming is a hoax.” So feel free to suggest something. By definition, books need not pass peer-review, so it’s a wide-open field in terms of what you can suggest. Pick the very best, strongest presentation of your viewpoint you can come up with, and I will have a look. I only ask that the book be available from the Auckland City libraries, so that I am not out of pocket.

And trying to dismiss peer-reviewed research as propaganda, Andy, seriously undermines your position. I cannot help but compare the claim with all those people who claim that evolution, fluoridation, vaccination and so forth are all propaganda put forward by corrupt scientists with no evidence whatsoever to back them up.

Interesting, isn’t it, that whatever the position, there is that unity in trying to allege corruption or unchallenged propaganda in the peer-review process in this one isolated field which happens to have come out with findings they personally don’t like.

That would be the bit where you said “all you guys ever come up with is propaganda,” Andy. Now, perhaps I’m being uncharitable, in that I have interpreted “you guys” as “everybody who has ever tried to convince me of global warming.” If I am incorrect in that, I shall withdraw the accusation.

On the other hand, “you guys” surely includes Ken, who, as the blog’s author, has written an awful lot of stuff in the past, some of which, I am sure, includes reference to the peer-reviewed research on climate change. “Ever” is a long time. Perhaps you’d like to check, lest somebody beat you to it and establish whether you’ve been commenting on these threads, and hence whether people have “ever” given you anything but propaganda to consider.

Still, it is nice to see that you are finally getting around to making somewhat larger claims.

Of course, one of those claims seems very silly indeed. After all, scientists do not arbitrarily pick out twenty-year periods and declare whether or not the trends over that particular period are due to anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions. Rather, they go right back to the Industrial Revolution and look at the overall trends since then, correcting Then they go back much, much further in order to establish whether such changes are anomalous in the context of all that time during which humans weren’t burning fossil fuels.

Picking an arbitrary 20 year period sounds awfully like something somebody would do if they had a particular conclusion they were looking to support and wanted to make sure it was reflected by a limited data series. Like, oh, I don’t know, the whole “no warming since 1998” thing.

Do feel free to point me in the direction of a peer-reviewed paper that says “temperature changes from 1975-1998 are due to global warming, but you should ignore the prior or subsequent temperature record” though. It doesn’t seem like something a scientist would say, but hey, I might be mistaken.

I do have a problem with “An Inconvenient Truth” being used as education material in schools…

NASA has education materials for schools.
It’s on the NASA climate change website.

I am glad that Cedric’s video from Peter Hadfield confirms that I am correct about the Vostok ice cores and Gore’s presentation in An Inconveneint Truth, by the way

I glad you watched it. So you understand that this is a P.R.A.T.T, right?
That was the point of the video after all.
You seem to have trouble being forthright about it.

No Chris, the true champions of the scientific method… are NASA.
NASA and every single scientific community on the planet.

Scientific Consensus
Ninety-seven percent of climate scientists agree that climate-warming trends over the past century are very likely due to human activities, and most of the leading scientific organizations worldwide have issued public statements endorsing this position.
The evidence for rapid climate change is compelling.
(NASA)

That consensus was built the old-fashioned way.
It doesn’t happen by conspiracy.
Blocking FOI requests, or “trying” (??) to get editors sacked somehow or “deleting comments” (of all things) doesn’t make a scientific consensus appear. It’s physically impossible.
There’s a scientific consensus on the moon landings, the safety of vaccines, Evolution and climate change etc.
There are no short-cuts.

… use tricks to “Hide the Decline”…

This is yet another P.R.A.T.T
All P.R.A.T.Ts are carefully recorded and debunked and archived. The only way they work nowadays is if people can’t google them or are unwilling to google them. If those are the people you are targeting then good luck with that. The rest of us can google it and recognise it as just a ritual P.R.A.T.T.
It’s the same as flags waving in a vacuum on the moon or Building No.7

Yep, that’s another P.R.A.T.T.
It sucks in people who don’t understand how statistics work.
None of them ask “Why specifically only 1998?”
What happens if we take off a year and work with 1997 or add one more year and work with 1999?
Of course, if you do that, the P.R.A.T.T collapsed.

Do feel free to point me in the direction of a peer-reviewed paper that says “temperature changes from 1975-1998 are due to global warming, but you should ignore the prior or subsequent temperature record”

I believe this is a claim by James Hansen.
The IPCC also generally assign a fairly low attribution to the early 20th C warming

Furthermore, I am not suggesting that we ignore the subsequent temperature record, for this shows little or no warming.

Scientists (including James Hansen) are unable to explain this lack of warming that we are not ignoring

Remember, James Hansen. He used to work at NASA, right?
They have a website……

Remember, James Hansen. He used to work at NASA, right?
They have a website……

Hansen =/= NASA.
NASA=/= Hansen.

NASA does indeed have a website. You are not using it.
Why is that?

This lack of warming is not a “PRATT”. Everyone acknowledges it. All the world’s science academies – NASA, the Royal Society, etc.

The whole “no warming since 1998″ thing is indeed a P.R.A.T.T
All P.R.A.T.Ts are famous. That’s why they are called P.R.A.T.Ts.
They are easily accessible on google.
There are lists of P.R.A.T.Ts for creationists and anti-vaxxers and HIV deniers and the “no warming since 1988” is a bog-standard P.R.A.T.T.

It sucks in people who don’t understand how statistics work.
None of them ask “Why specifically only 1998?”
What happens if we take off a year and work with 1997 or add one more year and work with 1999?
Of course, if you do that, the P.R.A.T.T collapses.

All the world’s science academies – NASA, the Royal Society, etc.

No.
I don’t nee you to tell me what NASA or the Royal Society is or is not saying.
Thanks but no thanks.
I don’t get my science information second-hand.
That would be stupid.
Do the right thing and go to them directly and quote them in detail and in context and represent the science honestly or don’t bother in the first place.
Primary sources and all that.

I’ll give you a hint. NASA has a website.
They’ve dealt with this 1998 P.R.A.T.T very effectively.
You just type in “no warming since 1998” and then NASA and…it pops right up.
It’s all there in plain English. No need for no-name blogs.
It will take you 10 seconds, tops. It’s really, really easy.

Same here. I have never understood how the hoax is supposed to actually work.
What are the nuts and bolts of the operation?
For example, I’d to know when the hoax started.
Which decade?
Was it before or after the Cold War ended?
I have never gotten a straight answer to that one and you’d think the conspiracy theorists would have at least thought a bit about it.
Asking “When” is hardly a trick question.

Therefore, the entire case of CO2 induced dangerous warming is based on the period 1975-1998

So…NASA is lying to the world and has been since 1998?
And they’ve successfully maintained this lie with all the other scientific communities on the planet?
Or is it that NASA is just doing what it’s told to do and all the other scientific communities are just going along with it?
So who’s giving the orders? The Jews? The Communists? The Nazis?
Who?
Or maybe NASA is the one being fooled…along with all the other scientific communities on the planet?
Ok, so who is fooling NASA?

– block FOI requests

Ok, how do you create and maintain a global scientific hoax from blocking FOI requests? That would be very impressive if that’s all it took.
Only how would you organise something like that?

– try to get editors of journals they don’t approve of sacked

Not much of a mechanism. You’d be better of just bribing all the editors.
Only that wouldn’t work because sooner or later, someone would blab or you meet an editor who’s already quite wealthy.
Of course, if editors everywhere of journals felt that they were at risk of being sacked due to lack of approval then….someone would blab too.
Lots of people.
I mean, do you
1)warn people ahead of time when they take up the editorship
2)warn them just before they are about to publish
3) you warn them after they’ve published.

All three options are badly flawed.

Warning people ahead of time is just going to piss people off.
What happens when you get an editor with a secret terminal cancer condition who happens to be a real bitch?
Plus there’s thousands of journals out there and the editors change so that’s something you’d have to monitor continuously.
Monitoring costs money and manpower. That doesn’t grow on trees.

You could warn them just before they are about to publish.
Only since they haven’t published yet…how would you know to warn them? Does an informant on the inside tell you? Ok, only now you need an informant on the inside….of every journal.
That could get expensive. What happens if your informant retires or has a sick day on the wrong day?

Warning them after the paper has been published is counter-productive.
After all, the idea is to keep it all a secret.
If the paper is already published, then the cat’s out of the bag.

– instruct their colleagues to delete inconvenient emails

I don’t see it. Even if you give this order, how do you make people obey it?
Even on a more basic level, who has the authority to give this order and how do they transmit this order?
Sending an email would be silly.
People forward emails all the time to the wrong inbox.
One disgruntled soon-to-be retiree and the whole conspiracy is toast.

What do you do with someone who tells you to piss off?
You could fire him or her but once you do that, what stops them from running off and telling all?
You could kill them but…(shrug)

Hoaxes are illegal. Commit fraud on the taxpayers dime and you go to jail.
Conspire to commit fraud and you go to jail.
The more people involved and the more time you have to maintain it- the greater the risk.
Global scientific conspiracies don’t physically work.
Once you get down to the practical day-to-day workings of it all, it just collapes under it’s own weight.
The moon landings are not a hoax. NASA really did go to the moom.
Climate change is not a hoax. NASA really is a pioneer and lead research community on climate change.
Both hoaxes are silly for the same reasons.

I can also go straight to the source and see what the lead author, Alex Otto, has to say on the subject. Surely he knows the content of his own paper, how it compares to other research in the field, and what the wider implications of the work are.http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/research/news/alex-otto-article

By the way, I already linked to the Hansen paper where he stated no warming over the last decade, and it was you Chris that claimed that it didn’t support my assertion

So if the statement “there has been no warming for the last 17 years” is incorrect, how much warming has thee been, anyone?

Also, Hans von Storch said recently that if the lack of warming (that you deny) continues for another 5 years, all the climate models will be invalidated, because none of them have a scenario of 22 years without warming.

HvS of course is a “climate scientist” but doesn’t work for NASA
His quotes are in Der Speigel, which you can find using your amazing Googling skills

Yes, Andy – “You have to hang out on the denier/pseudosceptic blogs to read about science these days” – hang out at Treadgold’s blog and you will be fed rubbish claiming that science has got the fundamental properties of CO2 all wrong. Your resident genius Richard Cummings is full of such “discoveries.”

Sure, and Nic Lewis, one of the co-authors of the paper, has some interesting commentary on the ECS figure…

Meaning what?
Surely Nic Lewis is capable of making his own commentary?

By the way, I already linked to the Hansen paper where he stated no warming over the last decade.

He did? And that means what according to Hansen?
Are you sure that’s all he said? Or are you just slyly quote mining him?

Also, Hans von Storch said recently…

Isn’t it amazing how theses scientists can’t speak for themselves?
Oh dear.
No.
You shouldn’t be doing this.
It’s not about individual scientists.

This scientist said this, that scientist said that, some other scientist said something else.
You could play that game forever.
Always without quotes.
It’s a method that we are all too familiar with from creationists and whatnot.

HvS of course is a “climate scientist”…

Why the scare quotes? What’s the difference between a “climate scientist” and a garden-variety climate scientist?

… but doesn’t work for NASA.

So what? Plenty of climate scientists don’t work for NASA.

His quotes are in Der Speigel….

I don’t get my science from quotes in newspapers.
I go to NASA.
NASA and every single scientific community on the planet.

So if the statement “there has been no warming for the last 17 years” is incorrect…

Well, either it is or it isn’t.
The question is, how does someone smart and intelligent find out?
You seem to be trying to make yourself out to be some sort of expert.
Only you are not.
You are just some guy on the internet name-dropping scientists as a Pavlovian response to some no-name blog that’s trained you to argue this way.
Hugely unimpressive.
I don’t need middle-men to pre-digest my science for me.
I go to primary sources…like NASA.

…how much warming has thee been, anyone?

NASA studies this kind of thing. They have a website.
So….if I want to know about planetary warming, guess what I will do?
That’s right.
I’ll go to NASA.
Not some newspaper. Not some blog. Not some guy on the internet.

NASA.
NASA and every single scientific community on the planet.
I’m smart that way.

Well, you certainly haven’t linked to it in this thread, Andy, and I do not remember everything we have said to each other in detail. I have my suspicions as to what was said, which do not seem to match your version of events.

But post the link again. Or find the previous discussion. Lay out your claim of what Hansen has said, and then we will compare it with his actual words, and the context of what else he has had to say.

Reading the original document is always a good idea.
Focusing on an isolated quote “helpfully” point out to you by some no-name blog? Not so much.
It’s a ritual.
Oh such and such a scientist said something shock and horror?
Really?
…
…
Really?
Spare me your analysis. Just give me the document. I’m sure it can speak for itself.
Going back to primary sources works every time.
You can keep the spin to yourself.

“Do feel free to point me in the direction of a peer-reviewed paper that says “temperature changes from 1975-1998 are due to global warming, but you should ignore the prior or subsequent temperature record”

I believe this is a claim by James Hansen.

Not according to James Hansen.

Scientists (including James Hansen) are unable to explain this lack of warming that we are not ignoring

Not according to James Hansen.

We can put this in the same box as empty assertions on glass jars and IR.

By the way, I already linked to the Hansen paper where he stated no warming over the last decade.

“He did? And that means what according to Hansen?
Are you sure that’s all he said? Or are you just slyly quote mining him?”

Yep. Called it.
It’s a ritual dance.
When climate denier make the ol’ shock and horror claim about some scientist or other, it never quite pans out according to spin.
Primary sources.
Just can’t get enough of those primary sources.
Quotes? Nah.
Let’s take the whole interview. Much fairer that way.

Just so you recall, Andy, I believe I asked you to substantiate your insinuation that scientists had said “temperature changes from 1975-1998 are due to global warming, but you should ignore the prior or subsequent temperature record.” Plainly, Hansen has not said any such thing in this paper.

That said, why did you feel the need to place an intermediary between us and the paper? Do you feel that Hansen’s words require careful quote-mining and spin before you can claim they support your personal beliefs?

Clearly a certain amount of spin is required, since that looks like a document with a reasonable amount of context. You know, other factors at work besides anthropogenic forcing, that kind of thing.

Because it was the first thing I found when I googled it. I thought Judith Curry did a fairly good job at summarizing what I would have said anyway. The link to the paper is at the top of the post.

Naturally, this would involve one extra mouse click for you and for that extra effort I apologise

I also apologize for not finding the time to ring up Auckland library and asking them if they have any books on why global warming is a hoax. I am unaware of any such books in print, but you did ask me to do it so sorry for the delay

I will try to find some papers that present the idea that only late 20th C warming is attributable to CO2 .

The five-year mean global temperature has been flat for the last decade, which we interpret as a combination of natural variability and a slow down in the growth rate of net climate forcing

Of course, you could read it from the “no name blog” from Judith Curry, but you can also read it here on this no name blog too.
Of course, there is a lot of context around this quote. Nevertheless, I am merely trying to persuade global warming pause deniers that there is a pause, slowing down or hiatus or whatever you want to call it – in the surface temperature record -, backed up by the “grandfather of global warming”, using a Primary Source of Information written by the man himself.

I find it odd that James Hansen can make an interview with the BBC that Cedric kindly provides (the BBC is a “primary source of information” ?) that contradicts his paper.

The GISS Temp does show some minor warming for the 21st C, unlike the HadCRUT series. Why is that? Well, we can find some primary sources of information that explain how GISSTemp uses interpolated data in the polar regions where no temperature stations exist.

Andy, you sneakily switch from “global temperature” to “global warming.” That is not honest and it misrepresents what the scientists are saying.

The recent lull in surface temperature increase is not unusual (just look at the temperature records) nor is it evidence that “warming” has stopped. It does not incorporate ocean warming or ice melting.

And despite the natural desire of deniers to cherry pick it is hardly the full story. As you said there is the context – and also, as Hansen points out, it can only reflect the net forcing. Intelligent analysis requires a slightly deeper look than you demonstrate.

Intelligent analysis requires a slightly deeper look than you demonstrate.

I have provided a set of papers and references.

Andy, you sneakily switch from “global temperature” to “global warming.” That is not honest and it misrepresents what the scientists are saying.

I didn’t sneakily do anything. The IPCC use the global surface temperature record as their primary metric for “global warming”. There may be other factors, such as ocean temperatures, but this is not what the IPCC primarily focus on in their reports.

The recent lull in surface temperature increase is not unusual

None of the IPCC computer models predicted the 17 year lull in temperatures (that was previously being denied by you). It is at the boundary of plausibility now
As Hans von Storch has stated, if the lull continues for another 5 years, (as predicted by the UKMO) then all the models will be invalidated

Andy, you dishonestly misrepresented Hansen, and that is typical. Because the pronouncements you refer to are making a point about surface temperature, not warming in general. And it is not true to deny the IPCC considers other elements of global warming as well as other forcing factors.

Climate models are not expected to “predict” such detail. Weather models do attempt this but short term abilities.

You are placing your hopes all on a sort term temperature record, not even an a typical one. That is not intelligent.

And, notice Andy, that the quote you gave does not say what you said. It does not use the term global warming – it talks about surface temperature. And it provides some context. It doesn’t draw the erroneous conclusions you do. Not does it make “predictions” that are unwarranted, as you do.

You are using such quotes and links more like a drunk uses a lamp post – more for support than illumination. Typical of cherry pickers.

So, Andy, you’ve established that scientists look at the entirety of the temperature record, incorporating both natural and anthropogenic factors into the models they use to try to describe the climate. That they do not simply ignore any particular time period.

Well done. No, really. You have thoroughly debunked your own insinuations about scientists trying to exclude portions of the temperature record.

You do realise, I trust, that you don’t have to telephone the library in order to browse their catalogue? The wonders of the internet mean you can check if they have one of your influential books in about five seconds flat. You might also say “the library may not have this, but I found it to be a good read.”

Now, I’m perfectly capable of running something down for myself, but I thought I’d give you the opportunity to share a book which encapsulates and communicates whatever it is you’re trying to convince us all of. Shall I take it that you are not aware of any such books? That, instead, you read only blogs in an effort to develop your thinking? That would explain a great deal, really.

Now, I’m perfectly capable of running something down for myself, but I thought I’d give you the opportunity to share a book which encapsulates and communicates whatever it is you’re trying to convince us all of. Shall I take it that you are not aware of any such books?

That is correct Chris.
I do not read books entitled “global warming is a hoax”, because I am unaware if them.
I prefer to use Primary Sources of information, such as scientific papers.
For example, the one I linked to upthread, written by Hansen at al, that acknowledges the pause in GW, is a “Primary source of information”.

You do realise, I trust, that you don’t have to telephone the library in order to browse their catalogue? The wonders of the internet mean you can check if they have one of your influential books in about five seconds flat

Wow, I have actually never heard of this “internet ” thing that you refer to. Is it new?

I shall Google for the Auckland library to ask them if they know of a book that doesn’t exist and that I don’t know about.

Then I can tell you how the non-existent book that I haven’t read has influenced me in determining something that I am not trying to convince you of

(1) Climate of corruption : politics and power behind the global warming hoax
Larry Bell
A startling and authoritative look at the special-interest groups that have corrupted the climate change debate.

(2) The inquisition of climate science
James Lawrence Powell
The Inquisition of Climate Science is the first book to comprehensively take on the climate science denial movement and the deniers

(3) State of fear /
Michael Crichton
In Paris a physicist dies after performing a laboratory experiment for a beautiful visitor. In the jungles of Malaysia, a mysterious buyer…

As it happens, I have read “State of Fear” which although a work of fiction, is quite illuminating

Also, a search for just “global warming” on the Auckland library site has at number 3 a book entitled Air Con by NZ writer Ian Wishart,

They also hold a copy of James Delingpole’s “Watermelons”

“Watermelons : how environmentalists are killing the planet, destroying the economy and stealing your children’s future /
James Delingpole
“The shocking story of how an unholy mix of junk science, green hype, corporate greed and political opportunism led to the biggest and most…

and also Scared to death : from BSE to global warming : how scares are costing us the Earth /
Christopher Booker
This book provides the first proper analysis of what in the past two decades has become an astronomic hidden drain on the economies of the…http://search.aucklandlibraries.govt.nz/?q=scared%20to%20death

Some of these books I have read.Some I have on my bookshelf yet to read. But thanks to the generosity of the Auckland ratepayer, you can get all these books to borrow for free,

Well, gee, Andy, I was unaware you felt so very restricted by a throwaway phrase “global warming is a hoax”. Plainly, you have no ability to put forward your own description of the kinds of books you think I ought to be looking at. Nor, in fact, to recommend any book you have read.

Now, I too can peruse the peer-reviewed literature. Unfortunately, I have no way of magically divining what message it is you or like-minded individuals would have me take away from your readings of a particular paper. Or even if you have read it. Hence why a decently written, well-referenced book would be useful in setting out your case.

Much like trying to find out what message it is that you are trying to communicate to us, getting any book recommendations out of you is like pulling teeth. Not exactly helpful if you want people to understand where you’re coming from or get them onside.

Here’s a thought. Recommend a book on global warming. Whether for, against, with qualifications, setting out uncertainties, talking about the scientists or controversies involved, whatever you think is some decent reading material on the subject.

Yes, Andy, but do you actually recommend any of those books? Do they encapsulate where you’re coming from? Are these the books I should be reading in order to understand your perspective, or that of the people on your side?

Because I’m certainly aware of a couple of them, and would have no problem borrowing them to read. But if they’re no good, well, that’s an opportunity wasted on your part.

Oh I see, you have joined my reference to “value for money” at the end of my comment, and that of Ian Wishart’s book much earlier on, to deduce that I claimed that Ian Wishart’s book was “value for money”

You know, Andy, the time to ask “are you serious?” is generally when the topic is first raised. That is, before you’ve managed to thoroughly tick off the person asking by trying to score points whilst aggressively refusing to give a recommendation.

Yes, I was serious. I had considered the matter closed, but if you would care to put forwards one or two books, available from the library, I may still read them at some point. Reading something from the opposing camp is, after all, still on my to-do list.

I do recommend Andrew Montford’s “The Hockey Stick Illusion – CLimategate and the Corruption of Science” by the way, which goes into all the trickery used by Mann and his followers.
Not to mention the dubious climategate enquiries, which is covered in the sequel called “Hiding the Decline”

This book is specifically about the hockey stick issue which is really restricted to paleoclimatology

Peter Taylor’s book “Chill” is quite a long and technical book, well referenced.

I’m told that Harold Amber’s book “Don’t sell your coat” is quite good

Bob Carter has written a couple of books – “Climate – The counter consensus ” I have read. “Taxing Air” is a more recent one that I haven’t

There is a load of quote – about 70% of the text was actually quoted. It’s a bad habit of Ian’s. mind you he managed to avoid things like the NRC report on the Hockey Stick. You should have seen the gymnastics he did when I pulled him up on that.

Ian’s book will appeal to those up who have the same politics – who blame the climate change “hoax” on a conspiracy of capitalists, communists. Greenies, authoritarians, statists, the UN and the protocols of Zion. No wonder he has such a bad reputation.

Oh, I can see now why you like the book, Andy.

Is it a slow day today again out there in private enterprise fantasy land? You seem to have a lot of spare time on your hands.

I find it odd that James Hansen can make an interview with the BBC that Cedric kindly provides (the BBC is a “primary source of information” ?) that contradicts his paper.

You are claiming that Hansen said something and putting spin on it.
Going to a Hansen interview and letting the man explain for himself is about as primary a source as you can get.
You have nothing. You’ve been caught out.

Ken: “Andy, you dishonestly misrepresented Hansen, and that is typical.”
Andy: “No I didn’t, I directly quoted his paper.
How is that dishonesty?”

It’s called quote-mining. It happens all the time with science deniers.
It’s an old trick.
Right from the beginning, I gave you a fair warning.

Andy: “By the way, I already linked to the Hansen paper where he stated no warming over the last decade.”

He did? And that means what according to Hansen?
Are you sure that’s all he said? Or are you just slyly quote mining him?

What else do you expect me to do?
How am I supposed to behave honestly?

Well, you could grow up and stop trolling but that’s probably too much to ask.

It’s really easy to represent someone.
You don’t use one, solitary isolated quote and studiously avoid everything else.
You don’t paraphrase them.
You don’t let others paraphrase them or single out one solitary quote.
You don’t tell others what someone “really” wanted to say.
You just let the person say it.

I have not isolated a single quote from Hansen. I don’t need to.
I just let Hansen speak for himself in the BBC interview. His paper is entirely unremarkable-climate denier wise.
Without the spin put out by the climate denier blogosphere, there’s no shock or horror.

I thought this was the usual game of cat and mouse where I propose a book and the rest of you have a good giggle and compare me with a moon landing denier or a creationist>

Well, you have only yourself to blame. Whining about how you are regularly compared to other nutters like moon landing deniers will not win you any pity. If you don’t want to be compared to them then there’s an easy fix.
Don’t do what the science deniers do.
Simple.
A couple of weeks ago, the anti-fluoride mob showed up here.
We treated them the same way we treat the climate deniers.
They got nowhere and they were exposed as idiots.

Take NASA for example (and all the science academies of the world)
NASA is a primary source of information.
They have a website…

Yep. There is a scientific consensus on the efficacy of fluoride.
There is also one on NASA making it to the moon.
And there’s one on the validity of the Theory of Evolution.
And on climate change, the link between smoking and cancer etc.

We can go to mainstream, scientific sources (like NASA) and see the work they do.
The nutters have to rely on blogs. They have nothing in comparison.

We get NASA.
NASA and every single scientific community on the planet.
You, unfortunately, don’t.
You have nothing.

NASA and and every single scientific community on the planet agree that we need to give more money to and every single scientific community on the planet to find out more about this great problem that and every single scientific community on the planet agree on

By thw way Chris, I also recommend Roger Pielke Jr’s book “The Climate Fix”, which has lots of analysis of climate policy,particularly explaining in some detail why many western nations are screwed with their “renewable” energy targets

What surprises me, Chris, is that you expect me to be polite on blogs like this.
Having had several years of listening to sneering, pompous, semi-literate ecotards/greentards/eco-fascists drone on about “deniers” and how morally superior they are, I actually have no time whatsoever for any of you

My only hope is that when you realise that the only way to draw attention to the “climate crisis ” that the Gore-bots and their fellow drones have created is to kill yourselves (preferably in a very visible way using fire), then I might start to take interest.

Andy Scrase, you are upset. I don’t care.
It sucks to be you.
You have only yourself to blame for being publically spanked on the internet.
You have nothing but blogs written by nobodies pondering over high-school physics and stupidly swallowed by derpers who make empty-headed assertions about glass jars and IR.
Dumb.

NASA and every single scientific community on the planet.!!!!

Yep.
It makes you look like a kook.
Just like the the moon landing deniers and the fluoride nutters and the creationists etc.
Don’t want to be lumped in with them?
Then don’t do what they do.
Simple.

NASA and and every single scientific community on the planet agree that we need to give more money to…

Savour the nuttiness.
It’s so beautifully stupid.
NASA.
NASA and every single scientific community on the planet.
(All of them, mind you.)
….and they’re in it for the money.
😉
All of them.
(The horror, the horror)
Every single scientific community on the planet going back decades.
It’s a global scientific conspiracy theory to end all global scientific conspiracy theories. 🙂
And you, Andy, have no idea how it could possibly work. None.
You don’t even know when they all started cooking the books to get all that sweet grant money.
Was it under Reagan? Was Reagan paying NASA to cook the books?
Was it George Bush Snr.?
Junior, maybe?
How did they get all the other scientific communities to play along?
Was Reagan paying the CSIRO too?
You have no idea. You can’t even begin to wrap your head around how physically impossible it would be to somehow corrupt NASA and every single scientific community on the planet and do it sucessfully for decades.

See, this is why you come across as a kook.
I tell you not to do what the kooks do and…you just go ahead and do something else that the kooks do.
You are not doing anything new.

Moon landing deniers make the same claim.
Creationists make the same claim.
HIV deniers make the same claim.
Anti-vaxxers with their “Big Pharma” talk make the same claim.
You’re a joke.
That’s why we treat you exactly like all the others.

My only hope is that when you realise that the only way to draw attention to the “climate crisis ” that the Gore-bots and their fellow drones…

No Andy.
We’ve covered this.
It’s nothing to do with Al Gore.

It’s NASA.
Say it with me slowly….N…A…S…A.

NASA and every single scientific community on the planet.
Versus you.
(shrug)

The Earth’s climate has changed throughout history. Just in the last 650,000 years there have been seven cycles of glacial advance and retreat, with the abrupt end of the last ice age about 7,000 years ago marking the beginning of the modern climate era — and of human civilization. Most of these climate changes are attributed to very small variations in Earth’s orbit that change the amount of solar energy our planet receives.
The current warming trend is of particular significance because most of it is very likely human-induced and proceeding at a rate that is unprecedented in the past 1,300 years.
Earth-orbiting satellites and other technological advances have enabled scientists to see the big picture, collecting many different types of information about our planet and its climate on a global scale. Studying these climate data collected over many years reveal the signals of a changing climate.

Certain facts about Earth’s climate are not in dispute:
■ The heat-trapping nature of carbon dioxide and other gases was demonstrated in the mid-19th century. Their ability to affect the transfer of infrared energy through the atmosphere is the scientific basis of many instruments flown by NASA. Increased levels of greenhouse gases must cause the Earth to warm in response.
■ Ice cores drawn from Greenland, Antarctica, and tropical mountain glaciers show that the Earth’s climate responds to changes in solar output, in the Earth’s orbit, and in greenhouse gas levels. They also show that in the past, large changes in climate have happened very quickly, geologically-speaking: in tens of years, not in millions or even thousands.

Scientific Consensus
Ninety-seven percent of climate scientists agree that climate-warming trends over the past century are very likely due to human activities, and most of the leading scientific organizations worldwide have issued public statements endorsing this position.

The Earth’s climate has changed throughout history. Just in the last 650,000 years there have been seven cycles of glacial advance and retreat, with the abrupt end of the last ice age about 7,000 years ago marking the beginning of the modern climate era — and of human civilization. Most of these climate changes are attributed to very small variations in Earth’s orbit that change the amount of solar energy our planet receives.
The current warming trend is of particular significance because most of it is very likely human-induced and proceeding at a rate that is unprecedented in the past 1,300 years.
Earth-orbiting satellites and other technological advances have enabled scientists to see the big picture, collecting many different types of information about our planet and its climate on a global scale. Studying these climate data collected over many years reveal the signals of a changing climate.

Certain facts about Earth’s climate are not in dispute:
■ The heat-trapping nature of carbon dioxide and other gases was demonstrated in the mid-19th century. Their ability to affect the transfer of infrared energy through the atmosphere is the scientific basis of many instruments flown by NASA. Increased levels of greenhouse gases must cause the Earth to warm in response.
■ Ice cores drawn from Greenland, Antarctica, and tropical mountain glaciers show that the Earth’s climate responds to changes in solar output, in the Earth’s orbit, and in greenhouse gas levels. They also show that in the past, large changes in climate have happened very quickly, geologically-speaking: in tens of years, not in millions or even thousands.

Scientific Consensus
Ninety-seven percent of climate scientists agree that climate-warming trends over the past century are very likely due to human activities, and most of the leading scientific organizations worldwide have issued public statements endorsing this position.

The Earth’s climate has changed throughout history. Just in the last 650,000 years there have been seven cycles of glacial advance and retreat, with the abrupt end of the last ice age about 7,000 years ago marking the beginning of the modern climate era — and of human civilization. Most of these climate changes are attributed to very small variations in Earth’s orbit that change the amount of solar energy our planet receives.
The current warming trend is of particular significance because most of it is very likely human-induced and proceeding at a rate that is unprecedented in the past 1,300 years.
Earth-orbiting satellites and other technological advances have enabled scientists to see the big picture, collecting many different types of information about our planet and its climate on a global scale. Studying these climate data collected over many years reveal the signals of a changing climate.

Certain facts about Earth’s climate are not in dispute:
■ The heat-trapping nature of carbon dioxide and other gases was demonstrated in the mid-19th century. Their ability to affect the transfer of infrared energy through the atmosphere is the scientific basis of many instruments flown by NASA. Increased levels of greenhouse gases must cause the Earth to warm in response.
■ Ice cores drawn from Greenland, Antarctica, and tropical mountain glaciers show that the Earth’s climate responds to changes in solar output, in the Earth’s orbit, and in greenhouse gas levels. They also show that in the past, large changes in climate have happened very quickly, geologically-speaking: in tens of years, not in millions or even thousands.

Scientific Consensus
Ninety-seven percent of climate scientists agree that climate-warming trends over the past century are very likely due to human activities, and most of the leading scientific organizations worldwide have issued public statements endorsing this position.

The Earth’s climate has changed throughout history. Just in the last 650,000 years there have been seven cycles of glacial advance and retreat, with the abrupt end of the last ice age about 7,000 years ago marking the beginning of the modern climate era — and of human civilization. Most of these climate changes are attributed to very small variations in Earth’s orbit that change the amount of solar energy our planet receives.
The current warming trend is of particular significance because most of it is very likely human-induced and proceeding at a rate that is unprecedented in the past 1,300 years.
Earth-orbiting satellites and other technological advances have enabled scientists to see the big picture, collecting many different types of information about our planet and its climate on a global scale. Studying these climate data collected over many years reveal the signals of a changing climate.

Certain facts about Earth’s climate are not in dispute:
■ The heat-trapping nature of carbon dioxide and other gases was demonstrated in the mid-19th century. Their ability to affect the transfer of infrared energy through the atmosphere is the scientific basis of many instruments flown by NASA. Increased levels of greenhouse gases must cause the Earth to warm in response.
■ Ice cores drawn from Greenland, Antarctica, and tropical mountain glaciers show that the Earth’s climate responds to changes in solar output, in the Earth’s orbit, and in greenhouse gas levels. They also show that in the past, large changes in climate have happened very quickly, geologically-speaking: in tens of years, not in millions or even thousands.

Scientific Consensus
Ninety-seven percent of climate scientists agree that climate-warming trends over the past century are very likely due to human activities, and most of the leading scientific organizations worldwide have issued public statements endorsing this position.

The Earth’s climate has changed throughout history. Just in the last 650,000 years there have been seven cycles of glacial advance and retreat, with the abrupt end of the last ice age about 7,000 years ago marking the beginning of the modern climate era — and of human civilization. Most of these climate changes are attributed to very small variations in Earth’s orbit that change the amount of solar energy our planet receives.
The current warming trend is of particular significance because most of it is very likely human-induced and proceeding at a rate that is unprecedented in the past 1,300 years.
Earth-orbiting satellites and other technological advances have enabled scientists to see the big picture, collecting many different types of information about our planet and its climate on a global scale. Studying these climate data collected over many years reveal the signals of a changing climate.

Certain facts about Earth’s climate are not in dispute:
■ The heat-trapping nature of carbon dioxide and other gases was demonstrated in the mid-19th century. Their ability to affect the transfer of infrared energy through the atmosphere is the scientific basis of many instruments flown by NASA. Increased levels of greenhouse gases must cause the Earth to warm in response.
■ Ice cores drawn from Greenland, Antarctica, and tropical mountain glaciers show that the Earth’s climate responds to changes in solar output, in the Earth’s orbit, and in greenhouse gas levels. They also show that in the past, large changes in climate have happened very quickly, geologically-speaking: in tens of years, not in millions or even thousands.

Scientific Consensus
Ninety-seven percent of climate scientists agree that climate-warming trends over the past century are very likely due to human activities, and most of the leading scientific organizations worldwide have issued public statements endorsing this position.

Funny how history repeats itself.
The trolling I can sort of understand. Yet why the sock-puppets?
What’s the point?
If you got banned and you create a new identity then that makes sense of a sort but why create multiple troll sock-puppets just to lay the same eggs before you buzz off again?
Wierd.
Multiple personality disorder or waaaaaaay too much time on one’s hands comes to mind.
Shame really.